


Terms of Surrender

by marzipan (orphan_account)



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Kidnapping, M/M, Unreliable Narrator, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-02
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2019-07-05 19:32:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15870285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/marzipan
Summary: When Jim Moriarty comes calling this time, Mycroft goes of his own volition. He has to. Moriarty has his brother over a barrel, though the consulting detective may not even know it yet.





	Terms of Surrender

 

 

The room is warmly furnished; cozy with its brocade upholstery and deep oak. The antique knick-knacks. The canopied, four-poster bed. The well-loved bookshelf in the corner of the room stuffed with everything from Slovakian fairy tales to leather-bound atlases.

 

Mycroft walks over to the floor-to-ceiling wall of books, and picks one out at random. Jules Verne, and worn at the corners.

 

He opens it.

 

All the pages are blank, and clearly all new paper, though they've been painted along the edges to give the book an older feel. Every book in the shelf is the same.

 

A speaker, a black ugly box affixed to the ceiling corner crackles to life. It is obtrusively at odds with the rest of the wood-and-tapestry room.

 

“Do you like it?” The voice is mocking, laden with static, and softens to a near purr. “I wouldn't want you to get _bored_ during your stay.”

 

Mycroft closes the book and slots it back into the shelf neatly. He bites back a sigh.

 

“Yes, thank you,” he says instead, affecting just the amount of polite gratitude to sound genuine and unaffected.

 

The line goes dead with a click.

 

.

 

.

 

When Jim Moriarty comes calling this time, Mycroft goes of his own volition. He has to. Moriarty has his brother over a barrel, though the consulting detective may not even know it yet.

 

Mycroft sees the web clearly, and he knows where all paths lead.

 

Moriarty - “Jim, please. We're getting to know each other and calling me Moriarty now just sounds so _formal_ , doesn't it?” - _Jim_ takes a seat across Mycroft, interrupting his silent drink, trampling over the _sanctity_ that is his private club.

 

Armed bodyguards flank every door and window.

 

Mycroft raises an eyebrow.

 

“This isn't much like you, Mr. Moriarty.” A reprimanding look. “Jim.” An all too satisfied smile.

 

“And how you would know what is _like me,_ Mycroft? I can call you that, can't I? It's an awfully intimate deal, after all. And you’re being awfully familiar with me, after all.”

 

Mycroft doesn't really have a choice.

 

On the laptop between them is a live feed, split into quadrants. Sherlock and his doctor, and the two sights trained on them.

 

“See, that's the problem with you Holmeses, you expect me to play by the rules, though the two of you adhere to different sets,” Jim continues. He sits back leisurely, crosses his legs.

 

“But two against one isn't fair, dear, and I've decided to take you out of the equation.”

 

Mycroft purses his lips. Such blatant threats were a wide departure from Jim Moriarty's usual M.O. While, yes, he was known to be a wildcard who always had an out up his sleeve, these wild strategies were meticulously planned and executed exits. This “walk or I'll shoot” play reeked of desperation. The man prefered to watch from afar, gently nudging events this way and that, in order to produce the desired outcome.

 

“And are you so afraid of me, Jim?” Mycroft leans forward in his seat, as if trying to get closer to the consulting criminal. Whether he succeeds in making Jim’s expression freeze in surprise or the man merely does so for show Mycroft can't quite tell.

 

“Oh!” Jim laughs. “Oh, yes. Scary big brother, always coming to the rescue, always cleaning up after reckless, unfettered Sherlock. No, I can't have that, can I? Sherlock dances beautifully, you taught me that, but I can't have you cutting in right before the dip, I can't let you steal my show.”

 

Jim rubs his hands together.

 

“We have a deal, yes?” He’s excited, breathlessly so.

 

“You know others will come looking, Jim,” Mycroft murmurs, voice low, as if sharing a secret he wants only Jim to hear. “I can scarcely take a vacation with the powers that be breathing down my neck, this will hardly work.”

 

“Oh, but you can take care of that for me, can’t you, big brother?” Jim returns in a stage whisper. “You’d do it for me, wouldn’t you?”

 

Mycroft is silent.

 

“You’d do it for Sherlock,” Jim wheedles.

 

Mycroft doesn’t exactly have a choice. Jim _did_ plan this well, a part of him realizes, but doesn’t want to admit. Mycroft is diligent and methodical, and there would have been a zero percent chance of forcing his hand into something reckless had Sherlock’s life not been in immediate danger. Jim had known the brother suspected he’d not do something so outlandish as to risk cutting the game short - risk Sherlock’s life.

 

He still might not be willing to risk Sherlock’s life.

 

But _might_ wasn’t enough for Mycroft, who had _no_ intention of risking Sherlock’s life in the least.

 

Sherlock was his brother, and Sherlock was his responsibility.

 

Sherlock was his greatest weakness.

 

Jim smiles, coy, sensing Mycroft’s change of mind, and holds out his own hand to shake.

 

Mycroft takes it.

 

.

 

7:59 a.m.

 

It’s the first morning, and Jim stares at his laptop screen, eyes trained on the main camera feed of Mycroft’s room. Unlike the clunky speaker, this camera is state-of-the-art, literally. A pilfered patent from the defense ministry. Infrared, night-vision, you name it. Jim hadn’t bothered to hide the camera either; and it must have been clear that the framed Rococo print was really a one-way window.

 

The Iceman sits pretty in 4K on his bed, almost meditative in his calmness.

 

The man had been up since around 5, and got up shortly thereafter, making use of the adjoining bathroom and adhering to what parts of his routine he could retain as if this was just a normal day of work.

 

Jim smiles as he sips his tea, sitting in his room, sitting in the dark. Maybe it made for a cliche picture, but he’s not ready for the sun just yet. He wants this quiet moment here with Mycroft, memorizing how the man looks and acts as he holds on to the last vestiges of calm. Before he loses sense of time and realizes he has no grip over his own reality.

 

Oh, Jim has so much in store for him. He wants to see Mycroft crumble. How long would it take, a week? Two? Jim doesn’t think it will be very long, no. Mycroft is soft; he’s had a physically easy life. He hasn’t done his own legwork in years, and his spy training is a faint memory of the past.

 

He’ll break, and he won’t even notice at first. Jim will turn up the heat bit by bit, until Mycroft realizes his hands have lost their shape and his legs have melded into something useless. And then Jim will come in and bite his nose right off. And then, while he’s immobile, Jim will chip away at him, chip, chip, chip, as Mycroft watches, helpless to do anything but watch.

 

Just because Jim can.

 

No, just to get at _Sherlock_ , he reminds himself. No need to let the planning get out of hand. No need to get too _clever_.

 

.

 

Mycroft’s left alone the whole first day, and he briefly wonders whether they mean to starve him to death. The taps work fine, though he notices they turn off for a few seconds, for every few seconds they are on. There’s a pattern to it - but not one important enough to consider.

 

He’s thankful he’s long made peace with his own restless mind, and as such it’s even, actually, quite relaxing to be able to visit parts of it he hasn’t frequented in years, in decades. He recalls a medical journal he had skimmed but hadn’t really considered two seasons ago, and sets about on a mental exercise to synthesize the elements mentioned in the study. It’d do wonders for bioenergy, if he could ever find the time to write down his findings and pass them on to a lab.

 

That he is now in the hands of his enemy - Sherlock’s enemy, really - and has no idea how his brother is faring in his absence, left to face the criminal kingpin on his own, is not lost on him. He knows he should be apprehensive that the peace he’s been afforded with so far will soon be ripped from him in the cruelest way, in order to affect the biggest impact.

 

He knows this, but decides there is no sense in worrying for it. No need to turn an otherwise easy stay into something difficult.

 

.

 

At 3 in the morning Bruckner’s Fifth blares to life, mangled by the lo-fi speakers.

 

Mycroft opens his eyes and thinks, ah, this is how it’s going to be.

 

It comes and goes at intervals for the next four hours, until the symphony has played in full.

 

Then Mycroft gets up, and sets about to his morning routine.

 

.

 

7:59 a.m., and Jim sips his tea as he watches the live feed on one screen, and a sped-up playing of the hours he had missed on another. Aside from the first day, the first moment Mycroft set foot into the room, he has never looked straight into the camera.

 

He hums along to the sped-up Bruckner - it’s actually quite peppy this way, like the theme song to a sitcom - and then switches off the second screen as the hours catch up to the present time on the live feed.

 

Mycroft’s being boring, as expected, Jim thinks, as he sinks his teeth into his toast. Now Sherlock - Sherlock’s a hoot. The game is now proceeding uninterrupted, and he doesn’t even realize his own brother’s gone missing. And even once he does, the man’s assistant will have a realistic enough excuse at the ready.

 

Jim’s not quite sure why a man such so much power and control is so, so _weak_ to his reckless brother.

 

They both knew Jim’s threat was a sloppy one - and they both knew it was enough to be effective.

 

“He’s digging his own grave, tsk tsk,” Jim says, though there’s no one around to hear. There is a mic on the desk though, a big red button that’ll turn it on so he can speak to the man in the room.

 

Jim doesn’t press it. He decides he’ll make him wait.

 

.

 

Food comes sporadically, as does light and darkness, and sound.

 

After three days of solitude, the next guard to deliver his meal enters the room with a chair, and takes a seat near the door, arms crossed. A new development.

 

Mycroft gleans a bit of the guard’s personal life but makes no move to engage him. The man follows Mycroft with his eyes and seems to be under instruction to watch him, quite literally.

 

Mycroft decides to ignore him.

 

.

 

The guards change day to day, at random, and so far Mycroft has seen three faces in seven days now - the second guard showed up twice in a row. Jim has not spoken to him in a week, barring the first day when he’d first entered and toured the room.

 

There is a fully functional camera and microphone, however, and Mycroft knows anything he’s done or said would have been made known to, if not Jim, then some henchman who would have reported it to Jim.

 

One of two the Rococo painting images affixed to the wall flickers, and then turns into a black and white feed of Sherlock Holmes in 221B Baker Street. This was their agreement - regular proofs of life.

 

Jim and Sherlock were allowed to play, but Jim was to make no move on Sherlock’s life for as long as he held Mycroft.

 

These are completely absurd terms, and they both know it.

 

“Poor Mycroft,” Jim coos through the speakers. There’s a slight pause, then the static rackets up as he blows on something near the mic, and then another pause and a swallow. The sound mixing is horrid. “Locked away in a prison of his own making, caged by his utter _sentiment_ for his baby brother.”

 

“Good morning, Jim,” Mycroft says, not taking his eyes off the feed of Sherlock hopping around the living room, explaining some theory of a working case to John Watson. It’s only right to seem polite.

 

.

 

Like this, with Mycroft’s gaze fixed intently on the screen, Jim also gets a perfect view of his every expression. The Iceman keeps his mask perfectly cool, even as Jim reaches out to speak to him.

 

It’s become a sort of morning ritual, to have his tea in front of the laptop, as he catches up with the past day’s footage.

 

Mycroft Holmes seems content to sit and wait.

 

He seems content to let the world fall to pieces around him, if that’s what keeps baby brother safe.

 

Jim finishes off his tea and sets the mug down, idly turning it around and around by the handle.

 

The game with Sherlock is...going. Quite predictable, actually, now that he’s rid Sherlock of his trump card.

 

There’s always some idiot out there just gunning to commit a crime, only some idiots have more means and money than others. They come to Jim, who injects a bit of _pizzazz_ , and then if he - oops - drops a hint or clue here and there, or makes the crime ostentatious enough, Sherlock comes sniffing around the edges, like a little bloodhound tracking Jim’s scent.

 

Oh, he may cause a bit of financial loss for Jim here and there, but the attention was _so flattering_.

 

Jim eats it up.

 

It’s a bit of an indulgence, a guilty pleasure.

 

He turns off the live feed of their favorite consulting detective, and smiles as Mycroft’s expression falls, just a _teensy_ bit.

 

Jim had heard, from Sherlock, no less, that Mycroft was one for indulgence as well. Fine dining, good liquor, fashion, furnishings, and so on. Not true, it seems. The man he’s seen the past week has the disposition of a monastery monk. Clearly his only indulgence is Sherlock Holmes.

 

Has Sherlock really been so blind?

 

And if so, what else has he missed about his own brother?

 

Oh, Jim wants to crack him open and see.

 

.

 

Mycroft notices the guards sit closer day after day, but he doesn’t let it show that it bothers him.

 

He is, in fact, exceedingly uncomfortable with his conditions, but other than solitude and voyeurism, little has been inflicted on him. The guards bring him meals seemingly at random, and after the first week there are additional items that come near every other day - soap, mismatching pajamas, socks.

 

Mycroft wonders if Jim mistakes him for his brother; boredom will not kill him the way Sherlock wastes away with it. He is not as finicky with textures and smells as his brother can be, where there is little else to focus on.

 

Mycroft has long come to rely on his mind as his most steadfast companion, and he’s been left to do so in peace.

 

It can’t be very entertaining, he thinks, folding away the suit he’s worn many days more than he’d like. Not for Jim, not for the guards.

  
He puts on the fresh linen shirt he’s been newly given, suspecting the temperatures in the room will, in an hour or so, drop to an uncomfortable coolness.

 

.

 

It’s not like his games with Sherlock haven’t brought additional collateral.

 

As the detective grows more famous, Jim’s repeat clients grow wary of him, asking subtly for _insurance_ , sounding _fearful_ Sherlock may perhaps catch on to their scents.

 

Jim scoffs, and they acquiesce, because really, what choice do they have?

 

But the impudence still has him in a sour mood, and near midnight he comes storming into his study, finding himself settling into the chair and desk he does every morning, flipping open the laptop screen to watch the feed.

 

Mycroft Holmes is asleep.  

 

From here, he can see the man’s steady breath, the slow rise and fall of his chest.

 

It’s meditative.

 

He counts the beats and lets the breathing keep time for him, and before he knows it, he’s lulled into a contemplative state yet again.

 

Jim’s mind is a fast-flying thing, a creature that beats its wings so hard shooting for the sun it nearly runs itself to death. (Sherlock is similar, and part of the reason Jim likes him so much.) It doesn’t help that it constantly speeds off at every direction all at once, threatening to pull Jim apart, stretch him so thin he doesn’t recognize his own mind anymore.

 

The work helps him focus.

 

It’s only when he has a concrete project to work on, a blank canvas and set palette and instructions to work with, that he can _focus_ , that he can channel that madness all in one direction.

 

It’s because he’s a creature driven by curiosity; he knows that. He can’t help but rise to the challenge to build the perfect mechanism to complete the task, then set it into motion and watch it perform just as he’s predicted.

 

Mycroft Holmes now isn’t what he predicted.

 

But he’s fascinating to watch nonetheless. Jim can scarcely understand why he does what he does. Jim thinks _he_ loves Sherlock, too, and he would never had made such a deal for him.

 

Perhaps Mycroft is more human than Jim is. And Sherlock more than them both.

 

.

 

“Tell me,” Jim says, leaning close to the mic. He’s behind the opposite frame today, the one-way window, but Mycroft doesn’t know that. “What makes you think the Sherlock you see on the screen is Sherlock in real time?”

 

It puzzles him that Mycroft is being so _stupidly_ trusting. The more he thinks about it the surer he is that Mycroft Holmes could have, that day when Jim set foot in his club, snapped his fingers and had them all rounded up and publicly hanged.

 

“I’ve proven time and again you can’t trust me,” Jim says cloyingly.

 

“Yes, you have,” Mycroft says. “You’ve also proven time and again you would sacrifice anything for the game. There’s no game with Sherlock incapacitated and me sitting around in a room doing nothing, unaware of his demise.”

 

Jim doesn’t say anything. He just switches cameras on the 221B feed to show a closer look to the kitchen table: mail is strewn across a good half of it, and near the top is a newspaper stamped with the day’s date. So much for disorienting Mycroft’s internal timeline.

 

.

 

Jim gets into character for his next job, he needs to get out, clear his head. He works 30 hours straight switching from character to character without a break because he doesn’t quite want this work-gifted focus to end.

 

When he’s playing a character, he _becomes_ the character. There’s only one man in his mind, he only exists as one single version. It’s an utter break from his normal insanity, where he’s Jim, just Jim, but he can’t tell which one.

 

Even Moriarty is hardly a real person.

 

He swings into the condo he’s keeping Mycroft - in reality he’s bought out the building, knocked out a floor to remodel to his wishes. Jim is humming, a bit dizzy, giddy, coming down from the back-to-back-to-back roles he’s just played.

 

He plops heavily down in the chair he’s in every morning, just in time to see Mycroft Holmes strip.

 

Jim pushes his fist to his mouth and furrows his brows. Something not quite right, and he _knows_ he’s off that he can’t tell right away what it is.

 

The guard scheduled to be in Mycroft’s room is there, seated just a step or two away from Mycroft’s bed. Mycroft stands another step or two away from that, placing his tie on the bed, and shucking off his shirt.

 

Mycroft has taken to ignoring his guards, treating them as nothing, not even furniture, which wasn’t unexpected. The guards in turn watch him stony-faced like the gargoyles they are.

 

But the guard today - he leers.

 

There’s a twitch of movement, and Jim stands so fast he knocks over the chair. He’s up even before the guard is, the guard who’s moving slowly, slithering like a snake toward Mycroft, before placing a large hand on Mycroft’s upper arm.

 

Mycroft stills, and Jim is tense, agitated. He wants to see what happens next. At the same time he can’t allow what he thinks will happen next.

 

He’s at the door before he realizes he’d left his room.

 

Jim stops at the door, surprised at himself - for just a split second - before throwing it open.

 

The guard has Mycroft’s arm twisted to his side, pinning the man against one of the bedposts, as he forces his lips onto Mycroft’s, his other hand disappearing behind his back, whether to hold his other wrist back or to grope him Jim isn’t certain.

 

There’s a gurgling sound, and then Jim realizes he’s crossed the room, and rammed the blade of the jagged knife he’d picked up on his way so hard into the guard’s back that it’s penetrated his heart.

 

Jim takes a step back, and watches the guard crumple to the ground.

 

He looks up - Mycroft Holmes is staring at him, with, for the first time since they made their deal, fear and confusion in his eyes. There is blood on his lips.

 

Jim slowly reaches out for it. His hand is shaking now, he notices, when he had been steady and still as he killed one of his own men. He places it on Mycroft’s cheek, thumb brushing just barely across the corner of his lips, chasing a drop of blood.

 

.

 

Mycroft had gone still the moment the guard approached him so brazenly; he’d been sure the man was acting without orders, yet undecided about his own course of action. He supposed going lax would minimize the encounter, and guessed that at some point Jim would then speak again, perhaps to taunt him. Perhaps to threaten to use it against Sherlock.

 

He hadn’t expected this.

 

He hadn’t expected to go into the near-shock state he was in now, leaning back on the bedpost, knees weak.

 

“Hey, hey,” Jim rushes to say, one hand on his face, another bracing him as he slid down against the post. Jim kneels before him as he sits back, he hears his own sharp intake of breath echoing in his ears, and is keenly aware of the dead body between them.

 

He wants to tell Jim not to touch him, but the man has already whipped out of reach. Too soon, Jim steps back, blanket in hand, wrapping it around his shoulders.

 

“Can you stand?” the shorter man murmurs.

 

“What?” Mycroft gasps. They’re going off script now, and he knows none of this can end well. It’s not surprising that his immediate thought is _oh, Sherlock_ , because in this state he doesn’t know if he’ll ever be fit to protect him again. _No_ , Mycroft thinks, and steels himself. He’s no stranger to throwing himself onto the tracks for his brother’s sake, and he’s still prepared to do it again here.

 

Even knowing that this man, Moriarty, is truly unhinged.

 

Mycroft had his suspicions, but he should have heeded them earlier.

 

He stares back into the eyes of that madman, who looks so soft and concerned for him at the moment, rubbing his arm from over the blanket, trying to be comforting.

 

“Let’s get you out of this room,” Jim says. The tone is stern and shockingly heartfelt, and Mycroft wants to pull away. “I’ll have someone clean this up.”

 

Mycroft forces himself to stand, ready to follow, and is relieved when Jim doesn’t press close but lets him walk on his own.

 

His sense of unease rises again when Jim leads him guilelessly through the flat - quite a large one that must have once been two or three units renovated into one. They stop in a bedroom that Mycroft realizes is Jim’s own once he steps past the threshold.

 

“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” Jim says. He doesn’t sound apologetic, not really, but he does sound a tinge regretful. And angry. His expression is livid as he bites his thumb and paces.

 

In another moment, he’s taken to ignoring Mycroft in favor of texting up a storm, and making two phones calls to bark orders at what must be additional henchmen.

 

One is a request for a cleanup and the other - he hisses at someone to make a list of every guard that’s been in Mycroft’s room, and put a bullet clean through their heads, that _nobody_ was supposed to touch what was his - makes Mycroft’s blood run cold.

 

Finally, he’s finished, and tosses the phone on his bed with a long, long sigh. He whirls around and sets eyes on Mycroft again, expression turning worried.

 

“Oh, Mycroft,” he breathes, taking long strides toward the door to draw Mycroft in. He goes without protest. Jim takes hold of both arms and guides him to the bed, setting him down on the edge. Mycroft can’t help it - he flinches - and Jim looks heartbreakingly hurt by it.

 

“I - I won’t hurt you, I _promise_ ,” Jim says fervently. Where this is coming from Mycroft isn’t quite sure. The man had grown fond of him over the weeks, sure, Mycroft isn’t deaf nor blind - but to this degree? Surely it’s unnatural.

 

Jim presses a harsh kiss to Mycroft’s forehead, a seal, a stamp, a promise, and then tips Mycroft’s head back to make him look at him.

 

“I won’t let _anyone_ get to you,” Jim says. His eyes look pitch black in this low light, bottomless pits, unfathomable depths.

 

Mycroft lowers his gaze, eyelashes fanned out with the tips nearly brushing his cheeks. Jim keens almost imperceptibly, and Mycroft knows now for certain he can use this, but it still feels wrong.

 

Slowly, he wipes away at the blood on his mouth with the back of his hand. Jim rushes to get him some water, a towel. The man practically tucks him into his own bed, then, not unexpectedly, lifts the other side of the duvet and crawls in behind Mycroft.

 

For a long moment, Jim is still on the other side of the bed, and Mycroft thinks that’s that. Then he rolls over and scoots closer, until his front is flush against Mycroft’s back, and brings a hand around to cover Mycroft’s heart. Mycroft’s own hand flies up to cover it reflexively.

 

“Oh, poor darling,” Jim whispers, “you’re all shaken up.”

 

Mycroft wills his own heartbeat to slow, and after a few counts, he manages it.

 

Jim sighs, almost dreamily, near Mycroft’s neck.

 

“Mm,” he says. “You’ve been using the new shampoo.”

 

Mycroft doesn’t answer, and Jim doesn’t seem to mind.

 

“It’s the same as mine,” Jim continues, then yawns. “I like that you smell like me.”

 

Jim seems to doze not long after that, but it’s a while before Mycroft manages sleep.

 

.

 

Jim blinks awake and assesses his state. A four-hour cycle was enough for him to feel refreshed, though he knows he should find time to sleep later, too. Job well done on all fronts, hits ordered on several men last night, and, ah, Mycroft in his arms.

 

_Finally._

 

He experiences a bone-deep sort of relief he didn't know he could feel.

 

Jim slowly pushes himself up on one elbow to peer down at Mycroft. The man’s breathing is steady, but it seems Jim’s moving around has woken him too.

 

Jim lowers himself to grace a whisper-light kiss on Mycroft’s still-closed eyelids.

 

“Morning,” he whispers. It’s still the middle of the night.

 

Mycroft shifts, so that they can look at each other face to face. He opens his eyes, face impassive as usual.

 

Jim smiles. Nice to know that he can rely on Mycroft to be Mycroft as usual. The Mycroft he’s come to _so_ rely on. He was a constant. A beacon.

 

He can see why Sherlock so prized him, and what a good choice he had made in taking him for himself.

 

His smile falls abruptly.

 

No, this wasn’t good.

 

How easily had one of his own men taken advantage of his weakness just hours ago, trying to snatch Mycroft away?

 

Jim’s breath catches in his throat. He couldn’t let anyone else _know_ \- know about Mycroft, where he was holding him. He had _promised_ last night that he wouldn’t let anyone get to him.

 

“Jim?”

 

Jim snaps out of his reverie; he’d been so caught up mapping out his plans to keep Mycroft hidden - to keep him _safe_ , to _protect_ him - that his face was one of worry and of fury and he hadn’t even noticed Mycroft’s creased brow - in concern - for him!

 

He feels his heart clench somewhere deep inside him, and entwines his fingers through Mycroft’s and _squeezes_ , mirroring the unfamiliar sensation for lack of a better way to express it. He looks at Mycroft and feels something fierce; they’re feelings unexplored, but he has time to learn it all - later - together with Mycroft.

 

Jim brings Mycroft’s hand up to his lips and presses a hard kiss against the knuckles.

 

“Don’t worry,” Jim murmurs. “I’ll fix it.


End file.
